Could my employer match contribution have caused me to have an excess 401K contribution?

Question

Could my employer's match have caused me to have an excess 401K contribution?

For 2020, I contributed the maximum into my 401k-Roth, $19,500. I also made a catch-up contribution (I'm eligible) to my 401k-traditional of $6500 for 2020. So I believe that's the max I'm allowed to contribute to my 401K, 26K. Is that correct?

Now I see that my employer contributed a match amount of about $4k. Is that $4k now considered an excess contribution because it pushes me over the $26K limit?

I don't have the 401k anymore (left the company), all rolled out into IRAs (Roth and traditional).

If the employer match is an excess contribution, can I take the money back out of my IRA? If so, can I take it from either my Roth IRA or my traditional IRA. Then would I need to make some sort of adjustment in wages?

Answer 1

The limit of $19,500 (plus an additional $6,500 for those 50 and over, for a total of $26,000) only applies to employee pre-tax contributions to Traditional 401(k) and employee contributions to Roth 401(k). It does not apply to employer contributions nor to after-tax contributions to Traditional 401(k) (the latter is the basis for the "mega-backdoor Roth IRA contributions").

There is a higher limit of $57,000 (plus an additional $6,500 for those 50 and over, for a total of $63,500) for all employee and employer contributions for you, and employer contributions and after-tax contributions to Traditional 401(k) are subject to this limit, but you are nowhere close to hitting this limit.

(All numbers are for 2020 tax year.)

Answer 2

No. Only your contribution counts to the limit.

What they contribute is affected by their limit and their rules.